Of Dances and Doughnuts
by amandajbruce
Summary: Set during and after the episode "More Than A Zombie to Me."
1. Chapter 1

A/N: This was a two shot. Part one before the dance, part two after. The dance being the 70s dance in "More than a Zombie to Me," of course. But, an idea for a third part came to me. So, it's a trio of chapters surrounding the episode.

I don't know if I am entirely happy with this story, but I got to the point where I did not really want to do anything else to it, so I do hope some of you like it.

Of Dances and Doughnuts Part One

"What do you think of this one?" Lilly Truscott held a blond wig up to her window. It was long, almost the same shade as her own hair, but it was feathered and had a lot more volume.

"Right now it just looks like a clump of hair," Oliver Oken told her over the phone. "You know, you could just come over here, then we wouldn't be running up the phone bill, especially since you just got your phone back from your dad." He gave her a look he was not sure she could see. "Photosynthesis, really. Make sure you study for Biology next time, or start paying for your own phone."

"And I said that you could come over here," she retorted. "And I did study. With you, remember? I wonder what you thought photosynthesis was." She gave him a look as well. "Just come over."

The two of them were standing in their respective bedroom windows, where they could see one another, but it was difficult to hear each other across the small strips of side lawns between their houses without yelling.

"I don't think so. Your mom is still mad at me for getting chocolate on her jacket." The last time Oliver had spent more than twenty minutes at the Truscott house he had dropped a bowl of chocolate ice cream on to the arm of the couch where Mrs. Truscott had thrown her brand new white pea coat. She had yet to forgive him, even though it was the dog's fault for running under his legs and throwing him off balance.

"Fine. Hang on." Lilly rolled her eyes at his fear of her mother. If he was not drooling over her, he was avoiding her. Kind of like any of the girls Oliver was interested in at school now that she thought about it.

"You're coming over?"

"No, I have to put the phone down so I can put the wig on," Lilly's voice was growing impatient.

"Oh. Got it." Oliver waited a beat. He watched as Lilly set the phone on her window sill, gathered her hair up at the base of her neck, and then tugged the wig on to her head.

"So?" she asked once she brought her phone back up to her ear.

"Very Farah Fawcett as an Angel." Oliver's head nodded approval.

"I know. My mom was one of Charlie's Angels for Halloween a few years back. I figured this would be easier than having to do my hair." She flipped her hair over her shoulder in her best imitation of her mother.

"Oh, yeah. I remember that. The next year she was Wonder Woman. She had the lasso and everything. Your mom always comes up with the best costumes for her office's Halloween parties." Oliver appeared lost in thought for a moment. "Is your mom a 'Star Wars' fan?"

"If she is, I will personally make it my mission to make sure you never see her in Princess Leia's golden bikini. Don't make me scrub your brain with soap." Even across the patches of grass, Oliver was sure he could see Lilly's glare.

"You don't know that's what I was thinking," he tried to protest.

"Don't I?" Lilly's glare intensified. "And we agreed that you would never even think about my mother and bikinis at the same time. It's just weird."

"Okay! Jeez! Let's talk about something else... What are you wearing?"

Lilly's brow furrowed in confusion and she looked down at herself. "Oliver, you can see what I'm wearing."

"So not what I meant! I mean to the dance!" Oliver could feel heat rising to his face.

"Oh!" Lilly realized what that had sounded like and her own face colored as well. "I found some pants and a shirt. Nothing really fancy, but they're very seventies. I found a pair of my mom's old platforms too. I'll actually be tall!" She pulled the wig from her head and went to put it on her dresser.

While she could not see his face, Oliver took the opportunity to ask, "how come you aren't wearing a dress? It is a dance."

"You know how I feel about dresses. They never look right. Besides, I'd have to find a dress that was seventies enough by tomorrow night, and I don't want to have to go shopping… again." Lilly made her way back to the window. "What about you?"

"Oh, I always have a hard time finding the right dress too," Oliver joked.

"You know what I mean," Lilly needled.

"I've got an afro. I've still got to find the clothes though. Maybe I'll get Miley to help me since you don't want to go shopping again."

"Good luck with that. She's being a big baby." Lilly picked up her hair brush and began to angrily untangle the long strands of her hair.

"Yeah, I heard that Jake finally picked a lucky girl after Miley turned him down twice," Oliver remarked.

"I know!" Lilly squealed in response. "And it was three times."

Oliver was a little surprised by the excitement and continued, "Yeah, it's too bad I was asked to fill in for the DJ, or I could have my pick of the ladies."

"Sure, Oliver." She giggled, temporarily forgetting her own anger at Miley.

"What? The Olley Trolley never stays parked in the station for long."

"Right. Keep dreaming."

"So, you going to hang out with angry Miley all night, or you want to help me DJ?" Oliver tried to keep the hopeful tone in his voice to a minimum. He did not want to spend his whole night alone, pushing buttons and loading records, even if he did like being the center of attention for the night.

"Umm.." Lilly turned away from the window again so Oliver could not see the expression on her face. 'Actually, Miley's mad at me. I don't even know if she's going to the dance. I haven't talked to her."

"Why?"

"Jake."

"Like it's your fault he asked some other girl?" Oliver's eyes rolled and he walked over to his desk to turn on his computer.

"Well…" she started.

"She turned him down three times."

"That never stopped you," Lilly remarked dryly, flopping down on her bed.

"That was different." He waited for his dad's old laptop to boot up and took a seat. "I guess it's just me and you then."

"No…" Lilly paused for a second and took a breath, trying to calm herself down all over again. "Jake asked me!" It came out as a squeal.

"He asked you what?" Oliver questioned blandly, already knowing the answer.

"To go to the dance with him, you doughnut!"

"Oh, right. That's cool. I'll spend the whole night without either of my best friends." He tried to put a little bit of Lilly's drama queen attitude into his voice, but he was never as good at the guilt trip thing as she was.

"Oh, please. You'll be too busy giving out your phone number over the microphone," Lilly teased him.

"No way. I don't want to risk getting suspended! If Jake's taken, I have to keep my options open for all of those other sad girls. I told you before, they'll need shoulders to cry on."

"Uh huh. Sure."

"This does explain why Miley's mad at you though."

"Hey!"

"What? I'm not saying she should be. She kept pretending she didn't like him." Oliver shrugged his shoulders even though Lilly could no longer see him.

"Pretending? Oliver, she acted like she hated him. How was I supposed to know?"

Privately, Oliver did not think Miley was all that great of an actress, but he did not say that to Lilly. After all, Miley had managed to fool him into believing she was a normal girl for the first two years of their friendship, so who was he to judge?

"I guess you don't need a ride to the school tomorrow night then." Oliver said it as a statement, but he was really fishing for more information.

"Actually, I told Jake I would meet him there because I'd already said I would help you set up all of your crap." Lilly flicked an imaginary piece of lint from her bed spread and sighed. "I never should have agreed to help you…" she teased him.

"Hey, you don't have to help." There was an annoyed edge to his tone now, and Lilly rolled her eyes.

"Of course I'll help, I already said I would. We can hang out after the dance too. Jake said he has to be home early because he has a shoot in the morning." Lilly was twirling a piece of hair around her fingers now, lost in daydreams of dancing with Jake in front of the whole school.

"Yeah, sure." Oliver did not sound quite as enthused, but she did not notice. "Just be ready by seven. My mom is going to drop me off, but she's going to some pastry class after. They're going to be learning how to make doughnuts from scratch and she's really excited."

"Doughnuts? Really? That's perfect." Lilly started laughing.

"Not another word out of you," Oliver warned her before they hung up for the night.


	2. Chapter 2

Of Dancing and Doughnuts Part Two

Oliver lugged his large metal case down the hall after him, saying goodbye to the teachers who were still cleaning up after the dance. He had tried calling both Lilly and Miley a few times to make sure they were alright, but neither was answering her cell phone. Even though they had seemed to be okay after landing heads first into the refreshment tables, he wanted to make sure they were not yelling at one another anymore. Not to mention he wanted to know why "fruit cup" and "chocolate pudding" were considered insults.

"Oliver! Finally! What took you so long?" Lilly was sitting on the steps outside of the school when he walked through the front doors. "I've been waiting forever!" she added dramatically.

"Lilly? What are you still doing here?"

"Hello! You're my ride home! We're supposed to be hanging out!" She looked at him as though he was from another planet.

"I thought you'd got a ride with Miley." He shrugged. "I just tried calling you and… did your dad already take away your phone again?" The metal case clunked onto the top step and Oliver sat down next to Lilly.

"Really?" She began checking her pockets, but came up with nothing. "Oh, no, I must have left it at home." She shrugged her shoulders. "So what are we going to do?"

"Wait for my parents to pick us up," Oliver told her, laughing. "Are you and Miley okay? You guys went down pretty hard in the snack food."

"Yeah, we didn't break anything and we worked it all out. We're both over Jake." Lilly nodded.

"Right." Sarcasm laced Oliver's tone.

Lilly sighed and said, "Okay, so maybe I still think he's cute, but I know he doesn't like me." Her eyes were downcast and her fingers were playing with the end of her belt.

Oliver remained silent. This was usually Miley's area of expertise. He tried to avoid talking to either of the girls about which boys they thought were cute or who they were trying to date. They gave each other really weird advice and he usually just ended up confused.

"I'm still the fruit cup," Lilly sighed.

"What does that even mean?" Oliver remembered the insults the girls threw at one another while they were each trying to get a piece of Jake Ryan, Zombie Slayer.

"You know… everyone always wants the chocolate pudding. Miley's the chocolate pudding. The fruit cup is always hidden behind the other desserts. The only time people get the fruit cup is because all of the pudding is gone." Lilly waved her arms around to prove her point.

"That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard." He ignored Lilly's glare to explain, "It depends on what else is on your tray. Like, say I have grapes or something already, do I need the mixed fruit? And if I decide I want to drink chocolate milk, do I want chocolate pudding too?"

"Is that a trick question? I would want as much chocolate as possible, duh."

"Even if Miley's the pudding and you're the fruit?" Oliver asked.

"Oh, right. Keep going." Lilly waved him on.

"Like I was saying, If I already have apple juice, then I'm not going to want more fruit, but if I have a piece of pizza, then my mom's voice is in my head telling me to get the fruit cup instead of the junk food."

"So, you'd only get the fruit cup because that's what your mom wants you to pick? You'd still really want the pudding? Thanks a lot, you doughnut."

"What? No, that's not what I meant. And stop calling me a doughnut!" Oliver looked confused. See, this is why he usually tried to not get involved with these kinds of conversations.

"What did you mean then?" She waited for him to gather his thoughts, trying to reign in her glare.

"I meant that a fruit cup is always better for you. It goes with just about anything, and you don't have to feel guilty when you add it to your tray." Seeing the confused look on Lilly's face, he continued, "Too much pudding just makes you sick. Sometimes you don't want more chocolate or that much sweet stuff, or whatever. And the consistency is weird once you've eaten enough of it. And it's just one kind of taste. If you get a fruit cup, there's all different kinds of fruit in it. Plus, the pudding's going to taste weird after eating something like fish or something…" his voice trailed off as her realized he was making less and less sense.

"What you're saying is that fruit cups are better than pudding, even if not everyone realizes it?"

"Exactly!"

"Thanks, Oliver. If it makes you feel any better, doughnuts are my favorite breakfast food, so even if I'm calling you an idiot, you're still my favorite idiot." She smiled slightly.

"Gee, thanks. I'll be sure to remember that."

Lilly laughed and then went on, "Did you see the way Jake looked at Miley when she came in though? He's got it bad for her."

"Well, she was wearing that dress," Oliver remarked, then cleared his throat when Lilly glared at him. "And she should not have been wearing that to a seventies dance. No." He shook his head.

Lilly groaned and put her head in her hands. "First my mom in a bikini and now Miley in that dress," she mumbled to herself.

"What?" Oliver asked her.

"Let's make a deal. I don't talk to you about boys and you don't talk to me about girls." Lilly raised her head and looked at the boy next to her.

His eyebrows shot up in surprise, but said, "Sure."

"It's just too weird," Lilly explained.

"Yeah, I am getting tired of hearing how dreamy Jake's muscles make him look when we're watching 'Zombie High.' And he's hogging all of the girls in school. Even Amber and Ashley are all over him," Oliver grumbled.

"What did I just say?"

"Oh, you wanted the deal to start now?"

"Duh."

The two of them sat there in silence again for a few minutes. Lilly waved to a couple of girls leaving at the other side of the parking lot before looking at Oliver expectantly.

"I wonder how your mom's cooking class went?" she asked him.

"Ooh, I hope she brings home doughnuts." Oliver said absentmindedly. "By the way, you better hope it's my dad that's picking us up, and not my mom, even if she does bring snacks," he warned Lilly.

"Why would that matter? What are you… oh!" Her eyes widened and her hands flew up to her mouth. "Do I smell that bad? Miley and I tried to get as much of the food off of us as we could!"

"Yeah, you smell like spoiled ice cream. " Oliver patted her on the shoulder reassuringly, and Lilly smacked his hand away.

"Spoiled ice cream? How do you even know what that smells like?" The question of who would be picking them up was temporarily pushed from her mind.

"Haven't you ever left a bowl of ice cream out in the sun for too long?" He asked her.

"Why would I ever leave ice cream out in the sun? Never mind." Lilly waved her hand as though dismissing that part of the conversation. "Your mom wouldn't, I mean, it's not like I'm covered in animal parts, I just got sherbert and fruit punch on me, right?." They were both remembering when Miley spilled essence of frog on Oliver's pants. Mrs. Oken refused to let him even get in the car, let alone ride home in it, smelling like frog. He had been forced to take off his jeans in the school parking lot.

"Look on the bright side, it's not the middle of the day." He smiled at Lilly, but the horrified look stayed on her face.

"Call your dad!" she demanded. When he laughed, she smacked him in the arm and repeated "Call your dad! Oliver!" She pinched him in the side.

"Okay, I'm calling. Stop hurting me." One of his hands was trying to hold her off, the other was busy fishing in his pocket for his phone.

"Make sure he's on his way to come get you, not your mom." She hit him in the arm again.

"I got it," Oliver snapped at her as he dialed. "Just stop hitting me." He continued to try to use one arm to fend her off with the phone to his ear.

"Who's hitting you?" Mr. Oken's voice came over the line.

"Just Lilly. I was checking to see if you were on your way to pick me up. We're waiting outside of the school."

Lilly did not hear what Mr. Oken said, but she did not like the look on Oliver's face when he said good-bye and hung up the phone. "What is that look for?"

"My mom's already on her way. Her class just ended and its on this side of town. She should be here in five minutes." He was struggling not to laugh.

"Eep!"

***

A/N: So, just so everyone does not get too excited, I've decided to leave what happens on the ride home up to your imagination. The next chapter will be different.


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: This is the last part of the story. It became a little longer than the others, but I became really interested in the doughnut making process. Enjoy!

Of Dancing and Doughnuts Part Three

A few weeks went by, and things slowly returned to normal. Jake Ryan still sucked in the attention of most of the female students, but Lilly and Miley avoided any mention of the television star they shared classes with. Lilly even avoided staring at his profile in class, even going as far as taking his poster down from her bathroom wall. She did not want to be reminded that a boy chose Miley over her. Miley tried her best to pretend the whole thing never happened. She did not want to be reminded of just how much she hurt her best friend.

She was combing through her hair after an afternoon shower when her phone rang. Spending the entire Sunday surfing with Oliver had led to a need for deep conditioning of her scalp and a long spray of hot water.

"Hello?"

"Lilly, guess what I just found out!" Miley's voice was excited at the other end of the line. Lilly could almost picture her jumping up and down.

"Umm…Orlando Bloom's going to your concert tonight?' Even though she knew it was unlikely, the idea served to excite Lilly almost as much as Miley.

"I wish. No, I just found out that my episode of 'Zombie High' is on tonight!"

"Cool!"

"I know!"

"But, you aren't going to be able to watch it," Lilly realized. "Your concert starts just before the show."

Miley sighed and said, "I know. Jackson's taping it, but who knows how that will go? I was hoping you could record it for me."

"Yeah, sure. I never miss an episode anyway." Lilly shrugged and continued to try and detangle her hair, ignoring the thought of seeing Jake and Miley onscreen together.

"Thanks! You're the best friend ever!" Miley's voice squeaked at the end of the sentence.

"Yeah, yeah. Go get ready. I don't want your dad to blame me when you miss your sound check."

Five minutes later, Lilly was crossing from her driveway to Oliver's, entering his house through the garage, not bothering to knock on the door.

"Come on in, Lilly," Nancy Oken said from the stove when Lilly walked into the kitchen.

"Oh, hi Mrs. O. I didn't know you were home. I thought you went to the zoo with everyone else. I was just coming to tell Oliver about the new 'Zombie High' episode that's on tonight." She took a step closer to the exit to the dining room, knowing Mrs. Oken did not really mind her just walking in. She had been doing it for years. Lilly paused when she heard the unmistakable sound of water rushing to the upstairs pipes.

"He just got in the shower. I made him help me bring the groceries in and take out all of the garbage before I let him bathe." Lilly smiled and sniffed the air. A familiar smell hung in the tiled room. It reminded her of breakfast.

"Are you making waffles?" she asked.

"No, no. I'm practicing making doughnuts." Mrs. Oken moved away from the stove, and Lilly was able to see a fryer set up on the stove top and a bowl of some sort of dough next to it. She had also set up bowls of powdered sugar, granulated sugar, and some sort of chocolate sauce. "You want to help me until Oliver comes back down?"

Lilly tried very hard not to laugh at the idea of her best friend's mother trying to master the art of doughnut making. She still found the entire thing amusing. "Sure," she finally said. "What do I have to do?"

"I already made the dough yesterday, so we just have to take a piece, roll it into a kind of tube, then you pinch the edges together to make the circle." She demonstrated as she explained. "Once we have a few, I'll stick them in the fryer. I already did one batch." She pointed out a plate with large chocolate covered circles on it. "Make sure you wash your hands before you help," Mrs. Oken added, gesturing to the sink with her chin.

Lilly removed the sweatshirt she had just put on and draped it over the back of a chair in the adjacent dining room. She pulled her hair back before she went over to wash her hands. Her mother rarely let her help in the kitchen, and her dad was a horrible cook, so she always liked to help Mrs. Oken when she asked.

Lilly carefully pulled a clump of dough from the bowl, then asked, "is this too much?"

"Hmm… I think it'll be fine." Oliver's mother nodded her head and pulled out a clump of dough for herself.

"So, why are you making doughnuts? I thought you finished that cooking class." Lilly carefully rolled the dough on the surface of the counter, forming a long tube.

"I did, but this was the only pastry I had trouble with, and I want to get it right." The corners of her mouth quirked up into a grin. It was one similar to Oliver's whenever he had a plan that was not going to work. "Besides, they're my favorite non-healthy breakfast."

"Mine too." Lilly smiled to herself and began to curl the dough in front of her into a big O. She placed it in the metal container that resembled a basket Mrs. Oken had set on the counter, and noticed the oil in the fryer had begun to bubble.

The two of them worked in companionable silence, and Lilly was grateful. At her house, it was never silent. Her mother was always asking questions about her day: her classes, her grades, boys, Miley, her plans with Oliver. It was never ending, and each piece of information just seemed to make her mom want to know more. Lilly would feed her one or two word answers until she was able to escape from the conversation by directing her mom's attention to her younger brother. Nancy Oken never pushed her for information. She would just make small talk with her, not usually hitting on anything really important. Lilly thought it might have been an interrogation tactic though. Lull the prisoner into a false sense of security, make them think you were their friend, then they would talk more easily.

When Nancy lowered the basket into the boiling liquid, Lilly paused in her thought process and asked another question. "What else did you learn to make?"

"A couple of different cakes, orange-cranberry muffins, cinnamon rolls, mainly breakfast pastries."

"Cinnamon rolls?" Lilly's eyes brightened. "I love cinnamon rolls." She told Mrs. Oken.

"Well, I could give you the recipe, if you want to try to make them with your mom." She cautiously brought the metal basket up out of the swirling oil to check on her project, then pushed it back down.

Lilly laughed as she imagined that conversation with her mother. "My mom doesn't like to let me use any of the kitchen appliances other than the dishwasher, and even then, I usually unload it, not run it."

Nancy laughed as she remembered Lilly and Oliver's kitchen mishaps from when they were much younger. "Heather really needs to get over that whole incident with the stove. You two were only eight."

"I know! We were just trying to bake my brother a birthday cake!" Lilly shook her head in disbelief. "Not my fault we didn't actually know how to use it," she muttered to herself.

"And at least you didn't turn her entire floor bright red," Mrs. Oken said, laughing to herself.

"I'm still sorry about that, you know," Lilly replied, feeling her cheeks turn a little pink.

"I know."

"It did look kind of cool though," Lilly said softly, not wanting to anger her best friend's mom. Mrs. Oken just laughed, and pulled the basket of doughnuts back up. This time she was able to dump the basket on to a towel on the counter, wanting to get some of the oil off of the cooling food. The sound of the water moving through the pipes had finally come to a stop, and Lilly figured that if Oliver could smell the doughnuts, he would be down to the kitchen in no time.

"Do you want to put those on to a platter for me once they cool off a little bit? I'm going to keep working on the circles over here."

Lilly nodded and wiped her hands on another towel. She turned her head as she listened to what sounded like a heard of elephants running down the stairs in the living room. Oliver was suddenly in the kitchen, still pulling a tee shirt over his head and his hair dripping wet.

"Jeez Oken, how can you possibly be hungry? You just had a cheeseburger and a half and a whole plate of curly fries from Rico's an hour ago." Lilly watched Oliver put on the brakes as he noticed she was in the kitchen.

"Didn't I just leave you at your house? I'm pretty sure I live here," he joked. "And I only had one cheeseburger." He started to reach for a doughnut in front of Lilly, but she smacked his hand away.

"You ate half of mine. And those are hot, they just came out of the fryer. You'll burn yourself."

"Surfing works up an appetite," he protested.

"Your mom already had those done." Lilly pointed to the plate holding the chocolate covered doughnuts, then watched as Oliver devoured one in two bites. She scrunched her nose up in disgust.

Lilly could hear Mrs. Oken laughing, even though she kept her back to the two teenagers, carefully adding a layer of doughnuts to the metal basket again. Oliver walked over to the fridge, grabbing a bottle of water.

"You want anything?" he asked Lilly, knowing his mother would want him to be polite. She did not realize that Lilly just helped herself when his parents were out of the kitchen.

"Nope, I'm good."

Oliver hopped up on the one bit of counter space that was not being used and asked, "so, what's up? I thought we were done surfing for the day."

"We are. It's gonna be dark soon, and I'm not allowed to surf at night," Lilly told him, rolling her eyes. "I just wanted to tell you that the episode with Hannah Montana is on for 'Zombie High' tonight." Lilly gave Oliver a look. " Miley can't watch it, so I told her I'd record it for her." Oliver gave Lilly a blank look for a second, but then the light dawned in his eyes.

"Oh, right. Miley's been talking about that one for the last month." Oliver nodded his head.

"And, I don't know how to use my mom's new system, so I was hoping I could record it over here." She might have forgot to mention that part to Oliver's mother when she came in earlier.

"Why can't Miley watch it?" Nancy Oken did not face Lilly when she asked and Oliver shot Lilly a wide eyed look of panic. He was never good at lying to his mom.

"Uh, I think she said she was doing something with her dad tonight. She asked Jackson to tape it for her, but he might tape wrestling or something just to mess with her." Lilly nodded to herself at her answer, then reached for the pair of tongs Mrs. Oken had put out for moving the doughnuts around. She carefully moved the doughnuts from the towel to a platter, then appeared to be thinking.

"What?" Oliver asked her.

"Powdered sugar or regular sugar?"

"Powdered," Oliver answered without hesitation. He watched Lilly pick up a spoonful and begin to sprinkle it over the six O's resting on the tray.

"When does that show come on? About an hour?" Mrs. Oken glanced over at the clock on the wall. "Why don't you help Lilly out with these doughnuts for a while? I'm going to see if you're father's on his way home from the zoo. And then you two can figure out how to record that show for Miley."

"I don't know how to make doughnuts," Oliver scoffed at his mother's idea.

"Neither did I until about fifteen minutes ago. Wash your hands." Lilly pointed the tongs at Oliver menacingly while she spoke and he grinned.

"You wouldn't hurt me with my mom in the room."

"Hurt you? Oliver I would never think of such a thing!" Her expression was the picture of innocence, but she was still pointing the utensil in his direction. He rolled his eyes and shook his head in her direction as he jumped down from the counter top. "Hey! Don't shake your hair water on the food!"

While Mrs. Oken was on the phone in the other room Lilly showed him how to shape the dough into a tube, but he kept elbowing her trying to mess up her perfect circles. She did not want to be the one to get a talking to from his mother, so she tried to resist the temptation to hit him back.

Lilly finally threw her hands into the air and said, "Fine! Do whatever you want!" Oliver spelled out his first name in dough and then put the letters into the basket. Lilly rolled her eyes at his antics. "Does that mean all of those are yours? Trying to make sure your little brother doesn't steal them from you?"

"If you stop being so annoying, I'll let you have the L," Oliver told her with his nose in the air.

"Hey! How am I the annoying one? I didn't even hit you!"

He kept making doughnuts in strange shapes and she manned the fryer until Mrs. Oken came back from the phone.

Forty five minutes later the two of them were arguing about just how to program the VCR in the living room and Nancy Oken was busy ignoring them and cleaning up the kitchen.

"Lilly, I'm telling you, you have to program the channel on the VCR and then set it to record. Just putting the TV on the channel and hitting record won't work!"

"Then we need to try it first. Make sure we do it right before the show comes on! We only have like, five minutes!" Lilly shoved the blank tape at him again, and waited for him to push all of the necessary buttons. They let the tape record for two minutes, then Oliver stopped and rewound it.

"See," he told her triumphantly as the commercial they had just witnessed popped back up on the screen.

Lilly groaned, knowing he would be reminding her that he was right for the rest of the night. She sank into the couch and pulled her feet up underneath her. "Just start recording! It'll be on soon."

Oliver climbed on to the couch next to her, and they prepared to watch the show. Lilly's phone rang just as the face of Jake Ryan filled the screen.

"Yes, it just came on. I'm recording. No, Hannah hasn't been on yet. I'll talk to you later." Lilly hung up the phone and put it back into her pocket.

"Miley?" Oliver asked.

"Of course." Lilly rolled her eyes again.

When Hannah Montana as the Zombie Princess appeared on screen, they began to pay closer attention. When she opened her mouth to speak though, Lilly and Oliver both cringed. Neither of them looked at one another.

The first commercial rolled, and Lilly looked at Oliver out of the corner of her eye. His head was cocked to the side and he appeared confused.

"He's known her for thirty seconds, and they're in love? I thought this was an action show."

"It's love at first sight, you doughnut!" Lilly whacked him with a pillow. "More importantly, what are we going to tell Miley when she asks us how she was?"

Their eyes met and Oliver shrugged. "We tell her she exceeded our expectations."

'What?"

"That's what my dad always tells me when I get above a C minus on a Spanish test," Oliver told her, shrugging his shoulders again.

"Oliver, you saw her. You heard her. She was awful."

"We did agree to always tell each other the truth."

"But she'll be humiliated!" Lilly looked torn.

"Not if all of Hannah's fans like the show." Oliver watched as the show came back on. Hannah was pulled into a bathroom by a pair of zombies.

"Not the third stall…" she called from the television screen before she was saved by Jake Ryan in an elaborate fight sequence.

"Why doesn't Hannah get to do any fighting?" Lilly asked, the feminist in her coming to the surface. "She's a zombie, shouldn't she be able to defend herself?"

"They probably couldn't afford a stunt double. I hear Hannah's a bit expensive." Oliver and Lilly both laughed.

When the show came to an end less than twenty minutes later, Lilly's pocket began to ring. She pulled her phone out and tried to give it to Oliver. "You talk to her."

"No way! You're her best friend, not me!" Oliver pushed the phone back to Lilly.

"I thought we were all best friends!" Lilly shot back.

"But, you're closer to her. You guys share clothes."

"I've worn your clothes before!"

"We were in fifth grade! And Miley hasn't!"

"Ugh. Fine!" Lilly pressed the button and brought the phone to her ear. "Hey, how's the show going? Oh, yeah, that's good. Yep, just watched it. Yeah, it was interesting. Oh, ok. Yeah, you should get back out there. I'll see you at school tomorrow!"

"Well?" Oliver waited.

"Someone threw flowers onstage," Lilly said brightly. It was Oliver's turn to roll his eyes at her. "You heard me, I said it was interesting, but then she had to get back out there."

"Tomorrow at school, we tell her it was great." Oliver looked at Lilly. "We have to."

"Even the kiss with Demon Dog?" Lilly shuddered at the memory of the scene and for a minute Oliver looked as though he would be ill.

"All of it."

"What if nobody else thought it was great?" Lilly asked him

"Doesn't matter. She's not going to be a big actress anyway. They just asked her to be on the show cause she's Hannah." Oliver shrugged his shoulders.

"Fine." Lilly crossed her arms and looked resigned to the situation.

Oliver got up, stopped the tape, and headed for the kitchen. "Want a doughnut?" he called over his shoulders.

"Is the sky blue?" Lilly muttered to herself and scrambled after him.


End file.
